Software News (460)

Whether for school or work, a lot of people have need of an office suite, and Microsoft Office has been the go-to suite for a long time. Office 2019 is scheduled to launch in the second half of this year, and according to a new Microsoft blog post, it will only be supported on Windows 10. As The Verge points out, this is very possibly a move by Microsoft to push companies to use either Office 365 subscriptions or upgrade their machines from Windows 7 or 8.1.

The blog post also states some other things about Office 2019, including that it will be released with Click-to-Run installation technology, so an MSI will not be provided for deployment. Also the suite's support schedule will be different, shortening the five years of extended support to just two. Microsoft says this is a result of needing to move to a more modern cadence, with management and security solutions being developed so rapidly now. This change only applies to Office 2019, and not any of the existing versions of Office, and it will still see five years of standard support; the change is only to extended support.

If any of you have noticed 3DMark wants to update today, that is because Futuremark has added a new benchmark to its suite; the Time Spy Extreme benchmark. It is the first 4K Direct 12 benchmark test, and was developed with input from the company's Benchmark Development Program, which includes AMD, Intel, and NVIDIA.

Along with being a more intense test for the latest GPUs, its CPU test has been designed to push processors with 8 or more cores. Compared to the original Time Spy benchmark, Extreme is three times more demanding, and it can also take advantage of advanced instruction sets up to AVX2, when they are supported. The update also comes with the Time Spy Extreme Stress Test, for when you want to check your system's stability.

Time Spy Extreme is a free update for anyone who purchased 3DMark Advanced Edition or 3DMark Professional Edition after July 14, 2016. For those with licenses prior to that date, you would need to purchase the Time Spy upgrade and add it to 3DMark.

At the Microsoft EDU event yesterday, the company announced plans to bring the full version of Microsoft Office to the Windows Store, with an expected release date sometime in June. The move may be related to the recent announcement of Windows 10 S, seen as a response to Google Chrome OS. By using the Windows Store, users will be able to access the fully capability of the software without an Internet connection.

Unigine has announced the Superposition benchmark, "a non-synthetic, accurate, and unbiased stress-test for the latest GPUs already on the market and for those that are still in the earliest design stages." The benchmark is based on SSRTGI technology, which was designed for use with the UNIGINE 2 engine, a ray tracing algorithm that makes "real-time light and shadow look as realistic as possible." Superposition provides a test suite that is comparable to workloads you would see in the latest games, making the performance more relevant than "synthetic" benchmarks. The benchmark is also compatible with multiple VR devices including the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive with modes for resolutions up to 8K.

Google has announced that the Chrome browser will change how it handles background tabs in an attempt to improve battery life. These tabs are estimated to "consume a third of Chrome's power usage on desktop." Users of Chrome on a laptop, tablet, or cell phone should see the most significant impact as these devices are more likely to be running on battery power. The improvement is due to a change in the throttling policy that "will delay timers to limit average CPU load to 1% of a core if an application uses too much CPU in background." Tabs that are playing audio or maintaining real-time connections won't be affected by the change. Google has stated that the long term goal is to suspend background tabs to further limit the power utilization.

A little more than a year ago AMD released Radeon Software Crimson Edition, which are new drivers for AMD GPUs and new software suite surrounding them. At the time it offered a new user experience, improved stability, better performance, more energy efficiency, and a dozen new or enhanced features. Today AMD has again released a major update to its driver package, called Radeon Software Crimson ReLive Edition.

There are several new additions and improvements that come with ReLive, with two particular stand-outs. Radeon ReLive is one of these, and obviously AMD believes this is an important feature since the whole package shares the name. The simplest description is that ReLive is AMD's response to NVIDIA's Shadowplay, which I believe has since been renamed Share in GeForce Experience 3.0. Since GCN 1.0 for AMD GPUs and Kepler for NVIDIA GPUs, ASICs (application specific integrated circuits) have been included on the chip for encoding and decoding at least h.264/AVC video, but it was NVIDIA that first offered a relatively simple, driver-included tool for capturing real-time gameplay using its NVENC encoder, without a significant performance hit. There have been ways to access AMD's VCE encoder, but nothing comparable to Shadowplay/Share from AMD itself, until now with ReLive. It has the ability to keep a video buffer, so you can capture something after it happens, or just record directly to a file, like NVIDIA's solution, but it also has some exclusive features. One is the ability to add a custom overlay image, so you can have a watermark applied at the time of recording instead of after the fact. It can also stream to services other than YouTube and Twitch. Getting into more technical details, it can record at a constant frame rate to maintain audio-video sync, and can record using the h.265/HEVC codec, if you have a Polaris-based GPU. (I feel it is worth noting that while h.265/HEVC may get you better quality videos than h.264/AVC, YouTube does not currently ingest videos made with this codec, so you will need to re-encode them to something else. There are many free tools for doing this, but it still is an extra step to the process.)

The second stand-out feature is Radeon Chill. Previous drivers already enabled a user to set a framerate target, which will keep a GPU from generating more frames than necessary, reducing power usage. Radeon Chill takes this a step further as it dynamical regulates framerate, reducing it at times there is little on-screen movement, further saving power. This not only reduces power usage but can also improve response time because of fewer frames being queued. Currently Chill can only be enabled in whitelisted titles, but it can improve power efficiency by 31%, lower temperatures by 13%, and reduced frame-time by 32%.

Other features include Borderless Fullscreen support for FreeSync, Gradual Refresh Rate Ramp for mobile setups, DisplayPort HBR3 support, extended WarrMan support to older GPUs, a better ability to detect bad HDMI cables, and accelerated VP9 decoding, for the Chrome web browser.

The AMD Gaming Evolved app was the result of a collaboration with Raptr and was "AMD’s counter to NVIDIA’s GeForce Experience offering similar features as game optimization made easy and the ability to record gameplay." The decision to stop bundling it with Radeon video drivers went into effect on September 12, but there wasn't a lot of fanfare around the decision. The move was confirmed by AMD in response to WCCFTech, with the company stating "Starting September 12th 2016, AMD is no longer bundling the “AMD Gaming Evolved App” by Raptr with builds of Radeon Software. The application will still work. AMD will cease to undertake any compatibility testing, install support or general technical support for this application, nor will it be available through Radeon Software or its installer. Previous builds of Radeon Software that include the “AMD Gaming Evolved App” dated before September 12th 2016 will remain intact and will not be affected." It is worth noting that the app can still be obtained from Raptr, but AMD will not continue development of any new features or improvements.

Futuremark has issued a software update for the 3DMark benchmarking software, describing version 2.1.2852 as a "minor update to fix problems reported by some users." The company has stated that benchmark scores won't be impacted for any tests other than the Fire Strike Custom test, which had previously used an incorrect setting that "resulted in slightly lower than expected scores." Also updated was the Systeminfo module for compatibility with the latest hardware along with the addition of a details button to describe settings for the benchmark tests. Futuremark also recognized some new known issues with the Time Spy benchmark on multi-GPU Windows 10 build 10240 systems and the inability to install the 3DMark app and DLC test data to the same folder.

Depending on the parts of the Internet you frequent, you may have seen some heated discussion about the recently released Time Spy benchmark for 3DMark, especially its implementation of asynchronous compute. Because of this, FutureMark has released a lengthy explanation of how Time Spy implements this feature of DirectX 12. It does get a bit technical but is still an interesting read. I have attempted to cover some of the main points below.

Before getting too deep into this, asynchronous compute needs to be explained. A modern GPU has to be able to do a number of things, so they contain specialized engines to perform specific tasks. Typically there will be at least one copy engine and a compute engine, and these will be separate from the 3D engine. These engines will also have their own queues of command lists (Direct of graphics, Compute, and Copy) and what asynchronous compute enables is for these queues to be executed in parallel. DirectX 11 did not allow for this and relied on synchronous compute, as there is no simple way to guarantee the commands are executed in the proper order. In Time Spy, the DirectX 12 engine does produce two queues, a Direct queue and Compute queue, that are passed to the driver. In the end, the driver and the hardware decides how the queues and command lists they contain are processed, which is important to note

If you have been following some of the news about how asynchronous compute can boost the performance of various games, you may have also seen that AMD GPUs typically sees a bigger boost the NVIDIA GPUs. This is because AMD's GCN architecture features Asynchronous Compute Engines (ACEs) in the hardware, while NVIDIA GPUs rely on a pre-emption method that requires a greater level of software control by the driver. At least that is the case for the newer Pascal architecture from NVIDIA (GTX 10xx series) as Maxwell GPUs (GTX 9xx series) have had asynchronous compute disabled within the drivers, so while Time Spy passes the drivers two queues (Direct and Compute), it serializes the command lists and makes everything run in the Direct queue.

Now we can get to what some on the Internet have deemed a controversial or bias move by FutureMark. All GPUs are sent the commands from Time Spy in the exact same way, meaning (in part) whatever GPU and drivers you have, a Direct queue and a Compute queue are sent to them to execute. The supposed bias comes from the observations that AMD's GCN-based GPU are often better equipped to utilize asynchronous compute than NVIDIA GPUs, and DirectX 12 would allow the benchmark’s engine to recognize the capabilities of a GPU and use a code path optimized specifically for the hardware. Time Spy does not take advantage of this feature of DirectX 12, and as someone with a background in science and having done lab work, it really should not. (Incoming editorializing.)

At the heart of this issue seems to be a question of what a benchmark is for. If it is meant to demonstrate the ultimate potential of one's hardware using all of the latest, supported technologies, then yes, Time Spy has failed. If instead a benchmark is meant to be a constant and consistent test of one's hardware, than Time Spy has succeeded. Considering the definition of a benchmark involves being a standard or point of reference for other things to be compared with or against, this second option would be the better. Having special and distinct optimizations for AMD, NVIDIA, and Intel GPUs means any measurements made of them cannot be directly compared without also considering the effectiveness of these optimizations. There are enough variables to consider when benchmarking without adding these.

While this approach does maintain Time Spy as a valid benchmark, there would still be the potential a bias in the design of the benchmark itself, but this is only in theory and not in reality. FutureMark has a Benchmark Development Program (BDP), which exists specifically to allow industry leaders to work directly with FutureMark on the creation of its benchmarks, and AMD, NVIDIA, Intel, and Microsoft are all members. In the two years of development that went into Time Spy, BDP members receive regular builds and have access to the source code for providing suggestions. This source code access is all in a single tree though, so each member sees every suggestion and comment made by every other member. In the end, each member approves the final benchmark for release, and of every benchmark FutureMark has made, Time Spy received the most scrutiny prior to release. If any systemic advantage exists for one manufacturer or another, the others would have known about it and still approved of it, or else Time Spy would not have released in this state.

In the end, Time Spy is a DirectX 12 benchmark designed to accurately and impartially compare hardware, which means it lacks any special bias or special optimizations. To see the impact those optimizations can make, look at the results of additional benchmarks and weight them all as you deem appropriate. That is why reviewers do more than one test after all.

Last week saw the release of the much anticipated Time Spy DirectX 12 benchmark for 3DMark, which had been teased in late June. This new benchmark leverages several features of the low-level API to push hardware to its limits with far, far larger workloads than the Fire Strike DirectX 11 test. For comparison, while the first Fire Strike graphics test contains 3,900,000 vertices and 5,100,000 triangles, the first Time Spy graphics test has 30,000,000 vertices and 13,500,000 triangles. The second tests again show an order of magnitude increase from 2,600,000 vertices and 5,800,000 triangles to 40,000,000 vertices and 14,000,000 triangles. You can check out the graph below, or the technical guide for more information on this.

While Time Spy does employ DirectX 12 to make this much rendering even possible, it only uses feature level 11_0. Feature levels are something introduced in DirectX 11 that FutureMark is already using in 3DMark with its older tests. Instead of having the other tests using DirectX 9 or 10 engines, all of the other tests in 3DMark use DirectX 11 but different feature levels to target the appropriately compatible hardware. By using feature level 11_0 for Time Spy, the performance gains of DirectX 12 can still be had while ensuring compatibility with DirectX 11 hardware, through DirectX 12 drivers. Time Spy does still use special DirectX 12 features, like explicit multi-adapter, improved multi-threading capabilities and resource handling, and the oft discussed asynchronous compute. (However, apparently NVIDIA drivers prevent Maxwell GPUs from using asynchronous compute currently, so the different queue types are run in sequence instead of parallel, as asynchronous compute allows. My GTX 980 uses Maxwell and it sees no difference between async being on and off.)

Anyway, that is probably enough technical stuff for now. Time Spy is going to be part of the free Basic Edition or Steam demo of 3DMark. The Advanced Edition will also receive Time Spy for free, but you will need to purchase the 3DMark Time Spy upgrade for $9.99 ($4.99 until July 23) to get additional features such as custom settings, the stress test, and the ability to skip the demo. Also the Advanced Edition will see a rise in price from $24.99 to $29.99 on July 23, but until then it is actually on sale at 60% off, or $9.99.

It was only a matter of time before Futuremark would release a benchmark for testing your system's DirectX 12 performance. While it is not here just yet, the DX12 Time Spy benchmark is coming soon, so the company has released its official trailer and several screenshots. It will be available for all versions of 3DMark on Windows.

Futuremark has previously released an API overhead feature test, which measured the number of draw calls a computer could make using different APIs, including DirectX 12, but this did not represent a true benchmark. Time Spy will be that benchmark and to make sure of that, it is using a purely DirectX 12 engine, designed to support features such as multi-threading, asynchronous computer, and explicit multi-adapter. Built with input from Microsoft, AMD, Intel, and NVIDIA, Time Spy is meant to not only push our computers but show the potential of low-level, low-overhead APIs like DirectX 12.

No word yet on the benchmark's release date, but 3DMark Advanced Edition is available at 80% off right now, along with PCMark 8 Advanced Edition, as part of the Steam Summer Sale.

After setting a new overclock for a computer, it is important to make sure it is stable under load, because if you push a system too far, it will crash and possibly overheat. To help check a system's stability, Futuremark has added new stress tests to the popular 3DMark benchmark suite.

There are four levels of stress testing to choose from, based on the Sky Diver, Fire Strike, Fire Strike Extreme, and Fire Strike Ultra benchmarks. Each level works by looping the benchmark 20 times without any breaks or loading screens, which takes about 10 minutes. These different levels allow one to test computers from mid-range builds and gaming laptops, to powerful 4K rigs. To pass the test, all of the loops must complete, and have a Frame Rate Stability score must be at least 97%. This score is based on the maximum and minimum framerates recorded during the tests, and represents how consistent the performance of your system is under load. If your framerate were to suddenly drop during the test, this could suggest your GPU overheated and throttled down, indicating a need for better cooling.

The 3DMark Stress Tests are only available in the Advanced and Professional editions of the benchmarking suite. While the Advanced Edition only runs 20 test loops, the Professional Edition can be set to run 2 to 5000 loops.

Installing an operating system is not a difficult process today, but it can take a long time, not because of the install itself, but the updates that came after release. To make the lives of those who maintain images of Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 easier, Microsoft is now offering convenience rollup updates.

For Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2, the rollup package contains all security and non-security updates since Windows 7 SP1 released, until April 2016. The package can be injected into image files for Windows 7 SP1 as well, but will require a servicing stack update from April 2015 to be installed.

For both Windows 7 SP1 and Windows 8.1, and three versions of Windows Server, monthly rollup packages will be available, containing all of the non-security fixes for that month.

Microsoft is making more changes to updating Windows than these. Previously updates have been published to both the Microsoft Download Center and the Microsoft Update Catalog, but in the next few months the Download Center will be depreciated. All updates will be available on the Microsoft Update Catalog, and this is where security bulletins will link to. Also, later this summer, the ActiveX control used in the Microsoft Update Catalog will be removed, allowing more than just IE to work with the website.

According to the latest data from StatCounter, a web analytics company, Firefox featured more usage than Internet Explorer and the new Microsoft Edge browser when looking at desktop browser usage on a global scale. In the month of April, Firefox boasted 15.6 percent global usage, while Internet Explorer and Edge featured just 15.5 percent. This represents the first time ever on a worldwide level that Firefox has had more overall usage than its Microsoft rivals, though it is worth noting that StatCounter analyzes browser usage from a total three million websites. Although recent reports have noted that Firefox is losing market share utilization, which is certainly the case from looking at the StatCounter data, it seems that Internet Explorer and Edge are following the same path except at a faster rate.

Despite the small lead that Firefox is now enjoying over Internet Explorer and Edge, Chrome continues to dominate in worldwide desktop browser usage with 60.5 percent in April alone, which is up 1.5 percent from February of this year.

AMD has officially released version 16.4.2 of its Radeon Software Crimson Edition, which includes a variety of highlights. Some of these highlights include new or updated Crossfire Profiles for Elite Dangerous and Need for Speed, as well as full support for Thunderbolt 3 eGFX enclosures that are configured with Radeon R9 Fury, Nano, or 300 Series GPUs. The latest version of the Radeon Software Crimson Edition for AMD also includes a wealth of resolved issues, to include things like The Division experiencing flickering while utilizing AMD Crossfire technology, GPU clocks being stuck on some products after an application crashes, flickering within the SteamVR Performance Test while utilizing AMD Crossfire technology, the power efficiency toggle showing up for some unsupported products, and more.

Radeon Software Crimson Edition version 16.4.2 is available to download immediately for 32 and 64-bit versions of Windows 7, 8.1, and 10.

NVIDIA has recently released version 364.96 of its GeForce hot fix driver, which primarily focuses on providing support for the Doom open beta that commenced just a few days ago. The driver also is said to have fixed some FPS drops that occur on select GPUs after waking up from sleep. Affected titles for this FPS drop issue include Dark Souls 3 and The Division, though some users on the official NVIDIA forums are reporting that Dark Souls 3 is suddenly crashing after installing the GeForce Hot Fix Driver 364.96.

For individuals that have a supported NVIDIA GPU and are still enjoying the Doom open beta throughout the rest of today, it just might be worth downloading the latest hot fix driver from NVIDIA.

Futuremark, the company behind several popular benchmarking suites, is rolling out a big update for 3DMark. This update adds a new user interface, a more flexible design, and for the Advanced and Professional Editions, a VRMark Preview. Naturally VRMark will be a virtual reality benchmark when it releases, but for now users can explore two test scenes with the Oculus Rift, HTC Vive, or their monitors, if they lack a headset.

The new user interface is designed to be faster and more flexible as additional tests are added. Already since this version of 3DMark launched, Fire Strike Ultra, Sky Diver, and the API Overhead tests have been added. To accelerate updating the suite, its internal framework has been rebuilt to allow individual benchmarks to be downloaded and installed independently. So if you do not need or want the Ice Storm tests, which are more geared for less powerful machines, you can leave them out. This applies to both the Steam and standalone versions.

Although AMD has done pretty well lately in regards to its driver releases that support the latest technology and video game titles, it looks like the company could be dropping 32-bit support rather soon. Various individuals over at the source link below have noted that when visiting the download center for AMD drivers and clicking on the 32-bit link for some of the Windows 8.1 and 10 drivers, a knowledge-base article about 32-bit support is now displayed. The article, which is listed as GPU-622, is titled “AMD Radeon R9 Fury, R9 300 & R7 300 Support for 32 Bit Operating Systems” and lists information about the GPUs providing “the highest levels of performance, visual accuracy and stability on 64 bit platforms.” While the 32-bit drivers in question are able to be found with some URL guessing, it seems quite evident that AMD is looking to focus its efforts primarily on 64-bit drivers in the near future, especially with its upcoming products. This seems true when looking at the company's recently launched Radeon Pro Duo GPU, which only offers 64-bit drivers at this time.

Not to be outdone by AMD with the release of its Radeon Software Crimson Edition 16.3.2 driver, NVIDIA has officially released its Game Ready 364.72 WHQL driver to its users. The latest driver from the green team includes full support for the Oculus Rift, the latest support and enhancements for the upcoming Vive headset from HTC, and the latest support for VRWorks from NVIDIA. Various optimizations and enhancements for virtual reality games, such as EVE: Valkyrie, Chronos, and Elite Dangerous, are included in version 364.72 of the NVIDIA Game Ready driver as well. In order to satisfy gamers who enjoy playing titles just as their released, NVIDIA's Game Ready 364.72 WHQL driver also provides the optimal experience for titles that include Quantum Break, Killer Instinct, Dark Souls III, and Paragon early-access.

Although it is not quite ready for download from the AMD website, Radeon Software Crimson Edition 16.3.2 has officially been released by AMD, coinciding with the shipments of the Oculus Rift to consumers. The latest driver from AMD comes with support for version 1.3 of the Oculus Rift SDK, and also supports the new AMD Radeon Pro Duo GPU. The driver promises to enable the Asynchronous Time Warp technology that the Rift provides through LiquidVR's Asynchronous Shaders and new Quick Response Queue feature. With the release of version 16.3.2 of the Radeon Software Crimson Edition driver, AMD has publicly noted that it has "worked very closely with Oculus to implement LiquidVR features into their software that take full advantage of Radeon GPUs."

FinalWire has officially made version 5.70 of AIDA64 available for download. The latest version of the tried and true PC diagnostic utility brings in a variety of features and support, especially for some of the latest hardware available to consumers. Some of the features and improvements of AIDA64 5.70 include AVX and FMA accelerated FP32 and FP64 ray tracing benchmarks, Vulkan graphics accelerator diagnostics, Microsoft Windows 10 Redstone RS1 Insider Preview support, and improved support for AMD Zen Summit Ridge CPUs and Intel Kaby Lake CPUs. Additionally, the latest version of the software from FinalWire now includes ACPI 6.1 support, Corsair Link sensor support, Corsair AXi PSU sensor support, Multiple pages support for Logitech Arx and RemoteSensor, RGB LED mouse support for Corsair, Logitech, and Razer, and more.

There are a number of popular methods for blocking ads in web browsers, with Adblock Plus arguably the most popular and well known. Opera has announced that it will begin bundling ad blocking software with its web browser, making it the first major browser to do so. The motivations behind ad blocking include "faster loading Web pages, increased privacy and security and a less intrusive web browsing experience." An Opera spokeswoman delved further into the reasoning, stating "Ad-blocking technology is an opportunity and a wake-up call to the advertising industry to pay attention to what consumers are actually saying." The technology will first be added to a version targeted at developers and early adopters with plans to move to its mainstream browser later. Perhaps this move could help the browser make up some ground on the four browsers ahead of it in usage.

It was revealed yesterday that the latest GameReady driver from NVIDIA successfully added Vulkan API support to the mix. Unfortunately, a wealth of users were reporting critical installation issues with version 364.47 of the GeForce driver when doing an "Express" installation. In order to remedy this, NVIDIA has pushed out version 364.51 of its GeForce driver. Although the driver is currently in a beta state, it has been submitted to Microsoft for WHQL certification, and will be updated as being WHQL certified in the near future. NVIDIA is recommending that pending installations of version 364.47 not be installed, and that users should instead utilize the new 364.51 beta version, or wait for the driver to be WHQL certified.

The latest WHQL drivers from NVIDIA, version 364.47, were released yesterday with Game Ready support for multiple upcoming games. Absent from our post yesterday is the fact that NVIDIA also added support for version 1.0.3 of the Vulkan kernel. Vulkan is the successor to OpenGL created by the Khronos Group, with version 1.0 made available just last month. As the API was just recently released there aren't many games that take advantage of it, but with this release "Nvidia has positioned itself advantageously against the competition as a result of being the first company to support both DirectX 12 and Vulkan in a complete, non-beta state."

Microsoft has announced plans to make its SQL Server database software available to Linux users for the first time. A move like this indicates that Microsoft "is now prioritizing the sale of its database software over the sale of the operating system running beneath it." This sentiment was echoed by CEO Satya Nadella who stated, "Our most strategic asset is not the server operating system." Users can start evaluating the software with a preview version now, with a full release expected during the middle of next year. The move could help Microsoft better compete against the many other offerings that are available, both open source and proprietary, a thought shared by IDC's enterprise infrastructure VP Al Gillen who "would expect this will also accelerate the overall adoption of SQL Server."

The latest batch of Game Ready drivers from NVIDIA, version 364.47 WHQL, are now available. Game Ready support has been added for The Division, Need For Speed, Hitman, and Ashes of the Singularity and will "ensure the best possible experience."The Division releases tomorrow and Need For Speed will be available a week later, while Hitman releases March 11 and Ashes of the Singularity is already available. Since the release of the new drivers, some users have reported having problems when using multiple monitor configurations. NVIDIA has acknowledged the problem and released a statement regarding the problem, "Initial investigation suggests the issue is isolated to multiple-monitor configurations. Should you experience issues, you can either disconnect one monitor during the driver installation (and reconnect once completed) or you can uninstall the driver through Windows Safe-Mode and revert to a previous version. Our driver team is actively investigating the issue and we will have more information shortly."

AMD seems to be on a roll lately with its beta driver releases, as the company has just pushed out Radeon Software Crimson Edition 16.2.1 hotfix to gamers. The updated driver comes just days after AMD released version 16.2 of its Radeon Software Crimson Edition driver, which provided gamers with various performance improvements and bug fixes. Radeon Software Crimson Edition 16.2.1 hotfix is a much smaller update for the company, as it focuses on delivering a Crossfire profile for Far Cry Primal, which was just release by Ubisoft yesterday.

AMD has just recently released its Radeon Software Crimson Edition 16.2 Hotfix, which ushers in a wealth of fixes and improvements for owners of supported graphics cards. The primary highlight for the latest video card driver from AMD is the support and optimization for Ashes of the Singularity - Benchmark 2.0, which is the first ever benchmark to boast Asynchronous Compute, multi-GPU, and multi-threaded command buffer Re-ordering that is a part of DirectX 12 benchmarking. Some of the other features included within Crimson Edition 16.2 Hotfix include Crossfire profiles for The Division and XCOM 2, various fixes for Fallout 4, multiple fixes related to AMD Freesync and AMD Crossfire, and various fixes, performance improvements, and quality upgrades for Rise of the Tomb Raider.

The hotfix version of Radeon Software Crimson Edition 16.2 is available for Windows 7, 8.1, and 10. More information on the latest AMD release can be viewed at the source link below.

TechPowerUp has officially released version 0.8.7 of GPU-Z, which brings in a multitude of fixes, improvements, and support for various hardware. The popular graphics subsystem information, monitoring, and diagnostic utility now properly detects the Radeon Software Crimson Edition Driver version, provides improved explanations for OpenCL detection errors on AMD GPUs, includes updated Armenian language texts, offers various stability fixes, and always displays the Revision ID as two digits. Version 0.8.7 also includes support for a multitude of NVIDIA, AMD, and Intel graphics processing units, and boasts fixes for a variety of detection issues.

The Vulkan API was first announced by the Khronos Group a little less than a year ago, and version 1.0 of the software API specification is now available. Vulkan is the successor to OpenGL and was initially based on the AMD Mantle API and is described as "an open-source, cross-platform low-overhead API that promises huge performance gains in 3D applications by giving developers low-level control of graphics and CPU hardware, much in the same way that games consoles like the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One do." A series of conformance tests were released with the API to ensure compliance with the standard, and a number of compliant drivers were released from NVIDIA, Qualcomm, and others. As the API provides better low level access, developers should see improvements in applications that can take better advantage of multithreading and memory management. Vulkan has the added benefit of being platform agnostic, whereas DirectX 12 and the Metal API from Apple are limited in availability. A number of significant game developers including Valve, Epic, Dice, and Unity have "pledged to support and have been involved in some way with the creation of Vulkan, but currently none have games that make use of the API."